Bioeconomy-Monitoring in Uruguay

Background and Objective

Research and innovation on biological sciences, technologies and digitalization is advancing at a fast pace, forcing policy to keep up with the implications of producing and using new processes and products made from biological resources. Like other countries Uruguay also aims to make use of these developments by setting-up policies supporting the shift from a fossil-based economy towards a more sustainable bioeconomy.

In order to understand how the Uruguayan bioeconomy is structured, how sustainable it is and how it will evolve in the future, in close cooperation with FAO and Ministerio de Ganadería, Agricultura y Pesca we develop a bioeconomy monitoring system. The system is based on our approach for a systematic monitoring of the German bioeconomy. It aims to monitor the major bio-based material flows as well as the sectoral significance of the bioeconomy and its respective sustainability effects.

By adapting and refining our monitoring approach to Uruguayan needs and framework conditions, the project may serve as an example on how to synchronize monitoring activities across countries.

Approach

With regard to the material flow based monitoring in close cooperation with Uruguayan stakeholders we follow a stepwise approach :

• define monitoring goals and system boundaries
• identify relevant bio-based material flows and their core products
• identify relevant sustainability effects associated with the material flow
• select indicators to quantify the selected sustainability effects
• quantify the selected sustainability indicators

This will provide a comprehensive overview on the magnitude bio-based value chains and associated sustainability effects. It allows to identify sustainability hot spots, reveals changes over time, allows for comparisons with fossil-based substitutes and provides information for countries monitoring imports into their bio-based material flows.

With regard to the sectoral monitoring we follow a similar stepwise approach involving Uruguayan stakeholders:

• define monitoring goals and system boundaries
• identify economic branches belonging to bioeconomy
• quantify the bioeconomy share in the identified branches
• identify relevant sustainability effects of the bioeconomy
• select indicators to quantify the relevant sustainability effects
• quantify the selected sustainability

This will provide an overview on the significance of bioeconomy and its sustainability effects on a national scale. It allows to monitor the development of bioeconomy over time, the progress made reaching monitoring goals or other benchmarks.

Results

• Monitoring the bioeconomy of Uruguay: bio-based sectors and related sustainability effects
  Project brief 2023/03a · Fernando Gordillo
  DOI:10.3220/PB1672741297000
• Monitoring the bioeconomy of Uruguay: bio-based value chains and related sustainability effects
  Project brief 20213/15a · Paola Pozo Inofuentes
  DOI:10.3220/PB1673535512000